Keep the Demand for an End to the Blockade of Cuba in the Forefront of the Movement

January 11, 2015

On December 17, in the White House cabinet room, Obama stated that although the blockade of Cuba had been a failure, there were other ways to achieve the same aim. The U.S. president did not claim that any of these other ways to “liberate” the Cuban people would be any less brutal. Nor did he claim that he would lift the blockade.

Even while sermonizing that without the introduction of U.S. “values,” the Cuban people can’t have “dignity and self-determination,” Obama did cite definite plans to enter into talks with Cuban diplomats over the possibility of opening mutual embassies.

The very fact that Obama would call a new method for achieving the same aim a “normalization” of relations with Cuba is a matchless testament to the utter deceit which has characterized U.S. “diplomacy” throughout the Obama administration. The fact that we have to point out the barest essentials of what Obama said is also a testament to the utter deceit of the capitalist media which absolutely refuses to present even the most basic facts in their concrete context.

Another feature of the marginalization and depoliticalization of people is the so-called “debate” taking place between the Republican and Democratic politicians. The Republicans widely advertise their “criticism” of Obama, calling it a “concession” to Cuba to have admitted that the blockade was a “failure,” while the Democrats and their opportunist “left-wing” claim that Obama’s speech shows that he is a “peace president” after all.

It is one of the favorite methods of the Democrats and Republicans to attempt to thwart the development of the independent political movement of the workers by putting on a show of being at each others throats even while both “sides” of the so-called “debate” remain within the limits set by the capitalists. Although this so-called “debate” varies according to the needs of monopoly capital, it always excludes the workers and prevents our country from finding solutions to the pressing economic, social, and political problems facing the people.

Not just with the U.S. intervention in Latin America and elsewhere, but also with all the fundamental issues facing society, the Democrats and Republicans are facing a crisis of legitimacy. Unable to mobilize people in support of their anti-social agenda, the monopoly capitalists are more and more trying to de-politicize people and degrade their consciousness.

For example, whenever the capitalists want to launch a new initiative – whether it be war against another country or the further dismantling of the public sectors of the economy – the people are bombarded with disinformation designed to mystify the causes of social problems and demonize the enemies of capitalism.

For more than half a century, the U.S. monopoly capitalist class has demonized Cuba while the U.S. government has continually organized terror against the Cuban people with the goal of overthrowing the government and restoring Cuba to the status of a U.S. colony or neo-colony. The U.S. government has organized internal subversion, sabotage and murder against the Cuban people. It has threatened Cuba with nuclear weapons, trained counter-revolutionary armies and political shock forces in the U.S. and kept up a nonstop campaign of ideological, political and diplomatic pressure.

In the face of all of these crimes, the Cuban people have successfully defended their national independence and defeated the aggression of U.S. imperialism. They have continued along the path of their revolution, defending their national sovereignty and determining for themselves their economic and political system.

In the U.S., as throughout the world, the struggle against U.S. intervention in Latin America and the entire aggressive war program of the U.S. government is one of the profound currents of the class struggle. In our country, the workers and people have no choice but to wage this fight.

As in the past, the American people oppose the aggressive, imperialist wars of “our own” government. For example, the American people created massive movements in opposition to the U.S. wars in Korea and Vietnam. Over the last decade and more, powerful movements have developed against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. So too, Americans from all walks of life have built up ongoing movements of friendship and solidarity with the people of Cuba and other peoples oppressed and attacked by U.S. imperialism.

Today, the American people have already given rise to a new, nationwide anti-war movement. This movement is part of a growing international front against war and imperialism which includes the liberation struggles of the oppressed peoples, the anti-war movement and popular struggles in every country as well as various governments and countries which are defending their independence and sovereignty and resisting the pressures and war program of imperialism.

Yet the anti-war movement in the U.S. is still tremendously hindered by the fact that it is, to a large extent, still spontaneous and unorganized and large sections remain under the tutelage of the Democratic Party, which is a party of war and imperialism. Political opportunism works within the anti-war movement to keep it under the domination of the Democrats.

Despite these political pressures, the anti-war movement keeps gaining experience and is straining more and more towards genuine independence, towards becoming a mass, oppositional movement.

The decisive practical question at this time is for the organized, independent forces, despite their small size, to bring anti-imperialist politics to centerstage. We have a principled, clear-cut political program and all the tools necessary to assist the consciousness and independence of the movement and build a genuinely mass independent, proactive anti-war movement.

Only the peoples can stop the war program of imperialism and the decisive thing is for the people to organize themselves, organize themselves and organize themselves.